


No Regrets

by Moonprincess92



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Police, Case Fic, Detectives, F/M, Love Confessions, Police, UST, kind of i mean the whole love thing is the most important takeaway here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-06
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2019-05-03 04:22:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14560761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonprincess92/pseuds/Moonprincess92
Summary: Detective Jyn Erso is leaving the NYPD to take up a new job in Washington D.C.She has exactly one more case to somehow tell her partner that she’s been in love with him the last four years.





	No Regrets

She was clearing out her desk when she found it.

The photo was taken at their first case-closed celebration. Him, exhausted and with a weeks’ worth of stubble that he hadn’t had time to shave and her, washed out and bruises coating the side of her face. She was still wearing the leather jacket that was stained with her father’s blood and she remembered drinking far too much that night but still accepting the small space that had apparently been made for her in the group. Bodhi had taken the photo, accidentally capturing the moment right before they had plastered on fake smiles. They were simply standing side by side, looking at each other. Her father had just died and they’d both nearly gone down with him. There was pain in their eyes along with a kind of reverence, like they couldn’t quite believe that the person in front of them was also still alive. Like they were thankful that they were still there.

They’d barely known each other two weeks.

Jyn’s fingers skimmed the edges of the now battered photo that she’d kept stuffed away in the cluttered drawer of her desk for the better part of four years. Quite honestly, she’d forgotten that she’d ever gotten it printed out. But with it in her hands again, she suddenly couldn’t quite bring herself to keep emptying out her desk and she collapsed back onto her chair with a large huff of air.

Four years. Her partner of four years.

She closed her eyes, yelling at herself for about the fiftieth time that this was the right choice. Job offers like this only came once in a lifetime. She’d done the things she needed to do, she’d eventually tracked down the bastard who had led to the murder of her father and helped take down the entire operation, she’d gotten her life back together… the only way forward was to carry on. As much as she loved the precinct, it was time.

“Jesus Christ, could you be any more obvious?”

Jyn leapt a mile, but would rather shoot herself than ever admit that Kay Tu had managed to startle her. She slammed the photo down out of reflex as she looked up to see him standing there across her desk, his arms folded and his face nothing but pure scepticism.

Not that that was unusual for Kay.

“Fuck you,” she said at once.

“As always, you are as charming as ever.”

“Any reason you’re hovering over my desk?” Jyn rolled her eyes.

 “Don’t you dare try and hide the fact that you’re attempting to slide that photo into the box,” Kay quickly called her out, Jyn’s hand freezing on the table top. “I know you, Jyn Erso. You don’t know what to say to Cassian.”

“What part of ‘you are the last person in the world I want to talk about it with’ do you not get?”

Kay was literally the last person who would understand whatever the hell was screaming through her brain right now. They had met during that first original case, a tech analyst who had only ever felt three(3) feelings his entire life and preferred computers over people. His only friend had been her future partner and though he had once leapt in front of a bullet to save her (he would literally never live it down), she was fairly certain he would rather stab himself than be having an emotional conversation with her.  

“No offence,” Kay huffed. “but you’re about as emotionally fucked up as I am.”

“At least I  _have_  emotions.”

Kay just clicked his tongue. “Well, what do you plan on doing with them?”

“Repressing the hell out of them seems to be working pretty well so far.”

“Christ in heaven, Erso,” Kay said, exasperatedly.

“Well, what DO I say?” Jyn snapped, fingers clenching around the edges of the photo that she was still hiding just inside her box.

“Might I suggest: ‘Hey Andor, thanks for being my partner, gonna miss you mate, also I’ve been in love with you the past four years’.”

“I’m not in love with him,” Jyn scoffed.

It really said something that Kay Fucking Tu was the one giving her  _that look_.

Jyn wilted a bit and hastily added, “Well, like… i'm pretty sure it hasn’t been for the entire four years at least.”

“I think that’s the first time you’ve ever actually admitted it.”

“I confess nothing,” Jyn shot out at once.

But she knew. And Kay knew, of course he fucking knew, because he’d been side-eyeing her basically ever since they met. The man didn’t get it, didn’t understand it, but even he could see the signs (also that one time he walked in on her sobbing over Cassian’s prone form in the hospital 2 years into their partnership might’ve been a bit obvious). They legitimately never spoke about it, the man just resolutely ( _and remarkably_ ) kept her secret and refused to acknowledge the feelings even existed.

The fact that he was finally bringing it up… said something.

She glanced up at his tall frame from over her desk. “Why now?” she asked. “We never talk about this.”

“Yes, lord knows I am all levels of uncomfortable right now,” Kay practically shuddered. “but you’re leaving and Andor’s crushed.”

His pointed look made her squirm with guilt. Cassian said nothing except for how happy he was for her, how proud he was of her for getting the promotion that she’d deserved for years now, would never say anything else because he was just that kind of person. Only… he was an incredible cop, but she still managed to catch glimpses of his face when he thought she wasn’t looking and every time, it was a look of utter desolation. Someone might have kicked a puppy in front of him. She remembered one vivid late night a couple weeks ago during a rather difficult case, where she had made a remark about not missing this once she got to D.C. They’d both been exhausted, and at first she hadn’t thought much about his hasty excuse of needing to stretch in order to leave the bullpen. But then she’d remembered, about how he’d been on the brink of breaking down the last few days, and had naturally stood to go after her shattered partner.

She’d found him in an empty corridor leading down to the interrogation rooms. Forearms pressed against the wall, his tears were masked only by his arms and years of damn good training. She’d seen the shake of his shoulders though and knew he hadn’t been taking the news of her leaving well.

She hadn’t approached him.

“Look,” she said, fighting to keep her voice even. “we’ve been partnered together a long time, of course he’s going to be sad I’m leaving. If I tell him that I…” She forced herself to unclench her jaw. “If I tell him… all that  _feelings_  crap, it’s just going to fuck him up even more.”

Kay just shook his head in exasperation.

“Why do I even try.” 

* * *

 

“Of course this girl had to die hours before the end of my last shift,” Jyn grumbled directly to the body of their latest victim. “THANKS A LOT.”

“ _Erso_. Respect for the dead, remember?”

“Whoops, I slept through that seminar.”

Cassian just shot her a look over his notepad, blatantly pointing out two rather horrified crime scene techs in front of them (clearly they had to be new around here).  

“ _Fine_ ,” she said. “Who have we got?”

“Apparently, this is Tania Henley, 27,” Cassian read off his notepad (always up-to-date, colour-coordinated and organised, unlike her own scribbled mess of notes). “this is her apartment. Neighbour called the police after apparently hearing loud arguing and the sounds of fighting. Sure enough… we find this.”

Jyn glanced down at the woman, lying spread-eagled on her living room floor from where she had clearly hit the corner of the coffee table on the back of her head. Without immediate medical attention, she had clearly been knocked unconscious and bled out. A fucking terrible way to die and as irritated as she was that this was holding her back from D.C., Jyn did feel for her.

“What do we know about her?”

“Not much,” Cassian admitted. “She’s a bank teller, lived a fairly quiet life according to the neighbours.”

“Why would someone want to kill her?”

“Beats the hell out of me,” Cassian sighed. Then he glanced over at her and added, “Look… I’m sorry about all this. I know you’d rather be on the road right now.”

“It’s not your fault, Andor.”

“Still.”

“Hey,” She shoved his arm, which was basically her only other way of showing affection aside from randomly texting him pictures of bizarre cold case files at 2am. “we get to at least solve another one together.”

“Our last case?”

She frowned at that.  _Last case_ sounded final.  _Last case_ sounded like she would never see him again.  _But it’s true_ , a voice that sounded suspiciously like Kay rattled into her brain.  _This WILL be your last case together, and isn’t that what you wanted? A last case, an end, a way out so you don’t have to ever address the feelings you have –_

Shut up, Kay.

“Yeah, but we’ll make it a good one, ok?” she said. “Come on, I’ll race you while canvassing. First person to find a lead wins ten bucks?”

Thankfully, he laughed. Her stomach spasmed a little at the sight.

They’d jokingly raced each other to the stairs, but it was only one floor down where Cassian apparently found a nervous-looking guy who kept twitching and would barely open the door. Jyn was all prepared to call bullshit on this lead  _(“Loads of people get nervous around you! You have that kind of presence,”_ ) but she realised that she’d lost before she could even fully get there.

“You have to protect me!” the kid was yelling through his door, Cassian exasperatedly standing with his foot shoved in the jam. “He’ll kill me too!”

“Look, whoever it was you saw, we can protect you from them,” Cassian called out. “Our witness protection programme is solid. I’d like my ten bucks now,” he added as Jyn approached.

“No way,” she insisted. “doesn’t count unless you can make him talk.”

“I’LL NEVER TALK!”

“Ok – Kyle, was it?” Cassian said back to the door. “Clearly you are scared, I understand that, but the way I see it we have two options. One, you talk and we give you the protection you want and need. Or two, you don’t talk and we leave you here defenceless against anyone who may or may not swing by to kill you for what you saw. I mean, it’s your choice.”

“ _I hate you_ ,” Jyn mouth at him.

“Fine,” Kyle called back. Cassian threw her a grin and she rolled her eyes.

* * *

“I don’t know exactly how much this is gonna help you guys, but here it is,” Bodhi still somehow managed to sound chipper as he slapped the sketch down on her desk. “Believe me when I say that I did not go to art school for this.”

“I’ll say,” Jyn pointed out, turning the sketch around so she could stare half in amazement, half in horror. “What the hell is this?”

“Not my finest work.”

“It looks like Tania was murdered by a bloated whale.”

Bodhi snorted, throwing himself down into the spare chair she kept near her desk. Usually it housed her lunch, a spare leather jacket or two, but occasionally the bubbly sketch artist who also worked for the NYPD. She had known Bodhi long before their police days, however, as stupid kids who’d just been trying to navigate high school without dying. They’d lost touch for a few years until they’d crossed paths once more in the bullpen. Bodhi eyed his botched sketch in distaste, but honestly it at least wasn’t the actual worst she’d seen.

“Look, your buddy Kyle wasn’t exactly great with the details,” Bodhi said. “Anywhere between 20-60 years old, probably white, he thinks maybe male, ‘some’ hair and solid build. He just narrowed down our suspect pool to basically every white guy in the city.”

“So he’s either stupid or lying about who he saw,” Jyn frowned. “Why? He’s scared out of his mind, doesn’t he want the bastard to get caught?”

“Maybe he’s too scared?” Bodhi shrugged. “Anyway, I’m not here to talk to you about bloated whales killing people.”

“You aren’t? Shit.”

“You were supposed to be on a train out of here twelve hours ago,” he pointed out.  

“For god’s sake, Bodhi, we’re not doing this–”

“Hey! I am your best friend and I care about your well-being–”

“You only care whether I’ve said anything to Cassian yet.”

Bodhi just threw up his hands. “Can you blame me?”

“First Kay, now you,” Jyn huffed. “Can’t you all just leave me alone?”

“Wait,  _Kay_?”

“Yeah, he chewed me out this morning,” Jyn said.

“I didn’t think things were that desperate, but apparently I was wrong,” Bodhi pointed out. “Babe, you gotta tell him. I know you aren’t exactly good with words, but–”

“I’m not good with feelings either!” Jyn cried. “Oh my god, can we please drop this?”

“Jyn–”

“Look, at the end of the day, you don’t know how I feel,” she snapped. “I love you, mate, but you need to stay the hell out of this. What I feel for Cassian has nothing to do with you and if you don’t back off, you might find that those photos of Prom 2009 that I promised you I deleted still somehow get ‘leaked’.”

“Are you fucking  _blackmailing_  me?”

“It’s how I roll, babe.”

“ _Fine_ ,” Bodhi said, pointing an accusing finger in her face. “this is the last thing I’ll say, and I don’t care if the entire precinct finds out about the Vomit Tux! You had better say something to Cassian soon, because the only reason you took the promotion in D.C. is because you’re running away from what you feel, and if you go you’re only going to feel depressed and ashamed of yourself – OK, I’m going!” he added, hastily getting up and scarpering at the look on her face. Normally, Bodhi was her one voice of reason. If she listened to no one else, her best friend was the one who could usually get through to her.

But he didn’t understand this. He  _didn’t_.

As such, she was wound up tighter than a spring when Cassian fell into her spare chair barely twenty minutes later. “What?” she said, barely looking up from her computer when she felt his eyes on her.

“What do you mean ‘what’?” he said in bewilderment. “Have you gotten Bodhi’s sketch yet or not?”

“Oh – right sorry, here,” she shoved the picture across the desk at him. “Congrats, your lead gave us this as a suspect. I want my ten bucks back.”

“Can’t. Already bought lunch,” Cassian said, picking up the sketch. “Are you thinking that he’s an idiot who honestly can’t remember or that he’s lying?”

“Bodhi thinks he’s still too scared to tell the truth.”

“Yeah, but what do _you_ think?”

She glanced up at him. Kyle wasn’t the only one too scared, she knew that. But when she’d spent 26 years of her life fighting off her emotions, it was hard to suddenly turn around and do the opposite. Her and Cassian had quite famously only ever put what they felt into words when either their lives were in danger, or one of them had just had a rather serious amount of alcohol. And she wasn’t all to blame, he was just as bad as her! It took six months for him to even say that he was glad that she was his partner over drinks at Kay’s birthday party. The words ‘I trust you’ had been implied from the moment they met but never actually spoken aloud until Jyn had a gun pointed at her head and many other moments had been brought about thanks to varying hospital visits all over the city.

She would never forget the ice running through her veins during the ride she’d taken in an ambulance once, about a year into their partnership. Negotiations with a rather deranged murderer had resulted in Cassian getting shot in the thigh and she didn’t think she’d ever forgive him for it. She’d all but held the EMT up at gun point to let her in the ambulance with him, but naturally had been expelled to the waiting room upon arrival at the hospital. Bodhi had worried that she would pace a hole in the floor before he was ever out of surgery.

When he’d finally regained consciousness and she’d been allowed in to see him, she had walked straight up to his bed and thrown herself into his arms.

“Erso – Jyn – what are you–?”

“This is a hug, I’m hugging you.”

“I can see that, but I’m wondering whether I’m on more meds than I thought,” Cassian had told her, delicately patting her on the back. “We don’t do this.”

“We do now.”

It was as simple as that. Cassian had eventually wound his arms back around her in return, smiling into her shoulder.

“Ok.”

She glanced up at the Cassian sitting in front of her. She would happily crawl into his arms now and never leave them, if she thought that might help. As it was, she coughed slightly and said,

“I don’t know, I think it’s worth looking into Bodhi’s theory.”

She didn’t know if she was imagining it or not, but she thought she saw Cassian sigh.

“Sounds good to me.” 

* * *

 

“This guy is honestly trying to make me murder him,” Jyn insisted for the millionth time. “He witnessed the murder, but doesn’t know the victim, doesn’t know the murderer, can barely remember what he looks like, but thinks he was probably her boyfriend? There were absolutely no signs of Tania even having a boyfriend, let alone a scary-murder boyfriend who vaguely resembles this bloated whale!” She held up the sketch in distaste. Honestly, Kyle Grady had to be the Least Helpful Witness she’d ever had, and she’d been doing this a fucking long time.

“I’d be scared to mention it at first as well,” Cassian pointed out. “Especially if  _you_  got murdered.”

“Oh, so you wouldn’t immediately try and avenge my death but instead would obstruct justice because you’re terrified?” Jyn said, mock angry. “Some partner you are.”

“Can you blame me?” he joked. “You’ve dated some vaguely terrifying people over the years.”

She wouldn’t challenge him to name one. He was kind of right.

“ _Fine_ , whatever, the excuse of being too scared is justified.  _For now_ ,” Jyn added, since she could tell that Cassian was immediately about to pipe up about her admitting he was right. Before he could say more, she pounded on the door of the next apartment. The waited a moment before the door was partially opened by a woman probably in her fifties with her hair in curlers.

“Yes?” she asked warily.

“NYPD, have you seen this man?” Jyn asked, holding up the sketch. “We have reason to believe he is involved in the murder of Tania Henly.”

“OH, you’re here about Tania, of course, oh my gosh,” the woman immediately flung her door wide open. “So terrible what happened, I adored that girl! So sweet and polite.”

“What’s your name, ma’am?”

“Jennifer Hall.”

“Ms Hall, again, have you seen this man?” Cassian asked, gesturing to the sketch that Jyn was still holding up impatiently. “He might have been seen in or around the building at the time of the murder. We also have reason to believe that he might have been Tania’s boyfriend.”

Jennifer snorted so loudly Jyn almost thought that her curlers were about to fall out. She exchanged an equally confused look with Cassian as Jennifer said,

“Oh, Tania definitely didn’t have a boyfriend.”

“How do you know?” Jyn asked.

“Because she was in love with the boy across the hall?” Jennifer answered as if it were plainly obvious. “Oh god, poor Bevin! I never even thought about how he must be handling this until now, how  _terrible_ –”

“Wait, wait, who the hell is  _Bevin?_ ” Jyn asked.  

“I told you – he lived in the apartment across from hers,” Jennifer explained. “They’ve been in love I don’t know how long, but I swear the entire building knows it! They never actually dated, but we could all tell. I had a bet going with Marjory next door that they would finally admit how they felt to each other before the year was out.”

Jyn found herself studiously avoiding Cassian’s eyes.

“Thank you Ms Hall, you’ve been very helpful – don’t leave town.”

Hastily retreating for the hallway, Jennifer looked almost disappointed that they didn’t need any more gossip from her. She let Cassian handle the phone calls part, since she was quite infamously known for abruptly hanging up on people  _(“The phone makes me nervous, ok? You can’t see their faces!”_ ) to the point where now, most people refused to answer at all if they saw her caller ID.

She… honestly didn’t know what she would do without him, most times.

“Well, Jennifer Hall was right – there is indeed a Bevin Dyer living at the address across from Tania’s,” Cassian mentioned after hanging up. “One of our officers apparently already spoke to him.”

“And he failed to mention that he was in love with her?”

“They weren’t together, Erso,” Cassian said, quietly. “He probably didn’t feel like he had the right to say anything.”

She chose not to respond to that. Recognising that they were approaching the right apartment just across from their crime scene, she was glad to be able to put a break in the conversation. She knocked on the door.  

“… I take it you’re here about Tania?” the stocky, bearded man with red eyes said as he answered.

“Right. NYPD, may we come in?”

He opened the door wide for them. At least his apartment didn’t immediately scream ‘I murder women by throwing them at coffee tables and leaving them to bleed out’ which was thankfully point one for Bevin. Jyn did notice a framed photo sitting on a cabinet showing Bevin with his arms around Tania during what was clearly a night out on the town. He must have caught her looking as Bevin gave a wary sigh as he sat down on an armchair, gesturing for Jyn and Cassian to join him on the couch.

“You know about our relationship, don’t you?” he asked.

“Don’t you mean your lack of one?” Jyn shot back.

Thankfully, the man snorted. She didn’t think she’d be able to handle tears at this point.

“Why didn’t you say anything to the previous officer who spoke to you?” she asked.

“Look, we weren’t official. We weren’t anything really other than good friends, I didn’t feel like it was my place to say anything,” Bevin explained. She could feel Cassian giving her a look that he was promptly ignoring as she carried on,

“Do you have any idea who would want to hurt Tania like this?”

“No,” Bevin shook his head. “I told the other officer already, she was a fairly quiet person, until you got to know her. Sensitive, intelligent… I managed to get that girl out of her shell, but she was timid around most other people. I can’t imagine who would want to hurt her.”

“Look, Bevin,” Jyn said. “I know you’re hurting. This sucks. But my next question I have to ask. Where were you last night when Tania was killed?”

Bevin looked like he wanted to shoot her a glowering look, but soon just wilted, as if all the life had just been punched out of him in a single blow. He simply didn’t have it in him anymore ( _she tried not to think about how she’d sported a rather similar look that time Cassian had been shot_ –).

“I was at work,” Bevin answered. “Not an hour goes by I don’t regret it.”

“Why’s that?” Cassian asked.

“I took on the extra shift,” Bevin said, pressing his fingers over his eyes. “Wasn’t even supposed to be working last night, Tania and I had made plans to hang out, but I said I would cover for Kyle.”

Jyn glanced at Cassian. She knew he was thinking the exact same thing.

“You don’t mean Kyle Grady, by any chance do you?” Cassian asked.

“Um, yeah?” Bevin said. “We both work at the diner. He asked and I could always do with the extra cash, so I said I’d cover him… why?” he seemed to have noticed the looks on their faces.

“Bevin, how well would you say you know Kyle?”

“Enough to cover a shift for him,” Bevin shrugged. “Bit weird, but who isn’t, right?”

“To your knowledge, have Kyle and Tania ever met?”

“Yeah, Tania hung out at the diner while I was working all the time,” Bevin nodded. “Again,  _why?_  I swear to god, if that son of a bitch did something –”

“Just exploring all avenues,” Cassian cut in smoothly. “Thank you for your time.”

They swept themselves out of the apartment pretty damn fast, all things considered. Once they had shut the door once more on Bevin’s angry and forlorn face, Jyn immediately yanked out her notepad and started ripping through the pages. “ _Motherfucker_ – Kyle told us he didn’t know Tania at all – goddamn it, why can I never find anything–”

“Because you don’t know the meaning of the word ‘organisation’,” Cassian suggested, plucking her notepad out of her hands. Without any hesitation, he somehow managed to flip to the right page, where she had hastily scribbled out notes during their initial interview with Kyle Grady. Although at this point, she was starting to realise it should have been an interrogation.

“Thanks,” she grumbled. Reading back on what she wrote, she carried on with, “Look, see! Kyle said that he didn’t know Tania, that the only reason he was in the building was because he was visiting friends, which is where we found him. But the fucker lied, he  _did_  know her.”

“His friends confirmed his story, though,” Cassian pointed out.

“Friends can be bought,” Jyn threw back. “Hell, he could have paid literally anyone to pretend to know him and say that he was supposed to be in the building.”

“So you’re suspecting Kyle now?”

“You aren’t?” Jyn said. “Would explain why he gave such a ridiculous description to Bodhi if he was the one who killed Tania. Not to mention that he was the one who pointed us towards Bevin, clearly trying to shift blame somewhere else.”

“Then we should talk to him again,” Cassian agreed. God, she couldn’t look away from him whenever he looked at her like that. That back and forth, the dialogue between them, it had always come so naturally to them. They had always worked so well as partners. She almost dreaded getting a new partner in D.C., but thankfully she didn’t have much time to dwell on it. Calling the officer that was currently assigned to Kyle’s witness protection, it became clear pretty fast that they had a slight issue.

“ _Yeah… he’s totally gone_ ,” the officer said over speakerphone.

“YOU LOST HIM?” Jyn said in outrage.

“ _Look, to be fair, we were treating him as a witness, not a suspect,_ ” the officer claimed. “ _But we had eyes on his residence the entire time, I swear! I don’t know what to tell ya, we did the routine check-in an hour ago, but he’s suddenly not here now_.”

“ANDOR?” Jyn waved a hand at Cassian, desperately.

Cassian held up a hand that she knew meant that he would handle this. He was always the more diplomatic one. Hastily taking the officer off speaker, Jyn quickly went through some of her own phone calls, forced to organise a goddamn search for one guy who could have literally been  _anywhere_  in New York City by now. Once they were both off the phone, they started out of the building without even needing to use words.

“Where would he go?” Cassian asked. “If he killed Tania, he’s probably trying to leave the city, right?”

“I’ve got Malbus and Îmwe on it,” Jyn said. “They’re tracking his credit cards, bank accounts, literally everything.”

“His phone?”

“Had the sense to leave it at home, apparently.”

“Damn it.”

“But look, that’s clearly about where the common sense ends with him,” Jyn pointed out. “I mean, he asked Bevin to cover his shift the night of the murder, like he basically just gave away an airtight alibi. The guy’s as dumb as fucking  _bricks_ , we’ll get him on something I’m sure.” 

* * *

 

Turns out, they got him trying to catch a bus to Philadelphia.

“Honestly, I’m disappointed,” Jyn said in the interrogation room. “This is my last case with the NYPD, damn it, I wanted something big! Why couldn’t you take someone hostage? Threaten to jump off a building? Seriously, you kill someone and your big plan is to just… _run away?_ ”

“I never killed anyone,” Kyle quivered.

“Oh, quite whining, we know you did it,” Jyn huffed.

“Erso,” Andor hissed at her. “We still need a confession, here.”

She rolled her eyes, but reigned herself back in. She honestly was a little underwhelmed, though. Things were always supposed to end on a high note. Didn’t cop shows always end with a dramatic series finale? Kyle wasn’t supposed to be stupid, he was supposed to be a calculating serial killer, someone they had been tracking for years and had finally come face to face with. Her and Cassian were supposed to catch him together, backing each other up and possibly kissing passionately over his dead body. The reality of the situation had been that she had hastily yelled at him that she could see Kyle in the line while Cassian used the bus station bathroom. Perhaps she wanted her big ending because then it would actually feel like she was really moving on. She was moving somewhere else, getting on with her life, not hung up on someone who didn’t want her back every goddamn second of her life…

But reality was never as glamorous. Their interrogation didn’t even last long. Kyle’s story started unravelling pretty quickly and he was soon sobbing and insisting that he hadn’t  _meant_ to kill Tania, he had only wanted to talk to her.

“Funny way of talking to her, throwing her into a coffee table.”

“I swear!” Kyle cried. “I loved her so much, I never wanted to kill her! I just – I just needed time with her, you know? I just knew if I spent some time with her one-on-one, talked to her, I’d make her see that I’m the one she’s supposed to be with. But she wasn’t listening, she was throwing away our future together and I don’t know, I just got angry–”

“And we know what happens when men get angry,” Jyn said, face stony.

“That’s not fair–”  

“No, it’s totally fair,” Cassian thundered. “Someone told you no, you got angry and lashed out. Too bad for you, there was a coffee table in the way and now you’re facing prison. If you could just sign the confession, please.”

In the end, he did. There was a lot of pleading and begging to cut a deal, but for some reason Jyn wasn’t feeling too lenient. She got a lot of satisfaction out of watching Kyle get dragged away in handcuffs.

“He thought he loved her,” Cassian was shaking his head, the two of them leaning together against his desk. She glanced over at him out of the corner of her eye as he carried on bitterly, “The entire time, it was about love and it was done terribly. The one who loved her properly did nothing, and the one who was obsessed with her murdered her. Honestly, I don’t know which is worst.”

“I’d say getting murdered is worse,” Jyn mentioned.

“Well ok, but still,” Cassian said. “they’re both equally as sad. Why would two people who are clearly meant to be together just torture themselves like that?”

“Beats the hell out of me.” 

* * *

 

“To Detective Erso,” Baze Malbus raised his glass in the air. “We wish you the best of luck in D.C.”

“Not that you’ll need it,” Bodhi grinned, nudging her side as everyone drank in her honour.

“Thanks guys,” Jyn said, genuinely touched that all of her colleagues had actually made it out to the pub to say farewell to her. They gathered around their usual table, halfway between the front and back exits of the pub, their small team of mismatched personalities and issues that somehow worked when put together. Baze and Chirrut were partners they often worked with closely, along with Bodhi and Kay. The six of them had been a team for so long, she honestly didn’t know what it would be like working with anyone else.

“So the case was pretty lame in the end, then?” Baze said into his drink.

“There was no dramatic stand-off, no one got shot,” Jyn shrugged. “Overall, I’m kinda disappointed. I expected a better last case than this.”

“Yeah, not like the Zombie Case, right?” Chirrut pointed out.

“ _I was drugged_ –” Jyn stormed as everyone else gave roars of laughter. It was over a year ago and yet she still apparently couldn’t live down the time they had all accidentally gotten poisoned by the drugs found on the body and ended up hallucinating for a good 12 hours until it wore off. While some of them had had rather tame imaginations (Cassian reportedly spent his entire ordeal thinking that he was back in Mexico and had spoken nothing but garbled Spanish) Jyn had quite famously genuinely thought that New York had fallen to a zombie apocalypse and that they had all been eaten… look, it had felt real at the time.

“That’s not the craziest we’ve ever had, though,” Bodhi pointed out. “Honestly, it’s gonna be hard for D.C. to top anything.”

“Isn’t that supposed to be a good thing?” Jyn asked.

“Ahh, who wants that? Such a boring life,” Chirrut waved a hand with a grin. “My personal favourite case was the Temple murder. The man was ripped apart, that was impressive.”

“But obvious to solve,” Baze countered. “Cool murder, boring investigation.”

“What’s yours, then?”

“Jenny Mathieson,” he answered at once. “If you give any other answer, you’re wrong.”

“The woman who killed her entire family and left clues behind to solve it,” Kay remembered, nodding his head. “It had games, riddles, a deranged psychopath – not to mention that Andor and Erso couldn’t work out literally any of the clues and had to come to me for help.”

“I wasn’t playing her game,” Cassian said, exasperatedly.

“We were going for a different approach,” Jyn backed him up.

“And might I remind you who figured it out first?”

She huffed into her drink.  “Look, the point of all this is yes, there have been dozens of way more interesting cases before this one. I just wish it had ended on a high note.”

“Shouldn’t you be more interested in spending one last night out with your mates?” Bodhi pointed out. “C’mon, Jyn, one would think you didn’t even love us!”

“I don’t. Love is dead and I hate you all.”

But the night carried on anyway, with more ribbing and reminiscing on some of their more colourful cases. Jyn took the teasing and tried to enjoy the company, but the longer time stretched on and the more empties littered their table, the closer she knew they were getting to the end of the night. Her stomach clenched at the thought and while looking at Cassian had always helped relieve that feeling in the past, now it only made it worse. She was supposed to be getting on a re-scheduled train tomorrow but he clamped a hand on her knee as he chuckled at Bodhi’s jokes and she knew that she desperately didn’t want to leave. She couldn’t.

But eventually last call was rapidly approaching and there came talks of heading home. Coats were pulled back on, chairs scraped and Cassian drained the last of his drink before placing it back amongst all the others. “This has definitely been a long enough day for me,” he said. “Bodhi, split a cab?”

Bodhi shook his head. “Nah, I’m staying at Luke’s tonight, he’s picking me up.”

“All good. I’m calling it a night then. Erso…”

Her chest clenched painfully as he turned to her, putting on a smile. The first of all the goodbyes, and she was pretty sure it was also the one she was least equipped to handle. He had never been a man of so many words, yet she still braced herself for whatever he was about to say.

“Have a safe journey, ok? And good luck in D.C.”

He slid off his stool and strode around the table to give her a quick cheek kiss and fierce hug. At least she didn’t have to process his words since she could concentrate on his body being wrapped around hers instead. She felt a hand slip into her hair, behind her head and out of the others’ sight, the other rubbing her back. Her arms wound tight around his neck, and she dreaded the moment he would pull back and walk away, because it would mean once again that she just hadn’t done enough. She hadn’t done what she actually wanted to do. It would be so easy to just fix it all, but …

“Be safe,” Cassian whispered against her hairline.

“I will. Thank you,” Jyn muttered back.

He pulled back without another moment of hesitation. He didn’t hang around. With only waves to the others, he had soon disappeared into the depths of the crowded bar for the street outside. Jyn stared after him, stuck to her stool as the others all gathered themselves to also leave. Their last case together definitely hadn’t been mind-blowing or world-renown, but Jyn figured it’d had significance anyway. Her and Tania hadn’t been all that different in the end. Reserved until getting to know someone, holding back emotions and missing chances, they were more alike than she cared to admit, to the point where Tania was an almost terrifying future. This job drove them all a little crazy. This job could kill her any damn day, and yet here she was still just fucking sitting on her arse and not saying anything because she was scared! She needed to change, to do what Tania hadn’t.

She had to tell him, she had to tell him,  _she had to tell him_.

“Jyn, are you–?” Bodhi began, but with a loud scrape, Jyn was leaping to her feet. “Wait, Jyn–?”

“I’m sorry, I’ll explain later!” she called back, already half out the door.

Her heart slammed in her chest as she pushed through the crowd. She staggered out of the doors to the bar literally seconds later, desperately trying to catch him before he left. Not that she would let that stop her. She would hunt him down all the way back to his apartment if she had to –

No need. She found him.  

“CASSIAN,” she yelled, and he turned.

Now that he was here in front of her, though, she suddenly wasn’t quite sure what to say. She came to a halt a few feet in front of him in the street, a cold wind whipping her jacket and causing his hair to stand on end. “What is it?” he asked, concerned.

She couldn’t do it. She had to.

“I – I don’t want to end up like Bevin,” she said. “Alone and always regretting doing nothing. I can’t… I can’t leave without…”

He took a step towards her, but she hastily moved back, keeping the distance. “Please,” she held up a hand. “Shit, Cassian… look, I don’t know how to say this because you know I’m not good with words, so I’ll just blurt it out and hope for the best –  _I’m in love with you_.”

It’s funny that her immediate thought had been that she should worry whether he might laugh at her, or tell her ‘I’m sorry’ or literally anything else that might come out of his mouth. Instead, he kind of said nothing. Had she broken him? His lean body didn’t move at all as he stood in the street, didn’t even budge when a cab finally pulled up alongside him. He only reacted when the cab driver eventually got impatient and yelled, “Hey, are you getting in or what?” and Cassian turned around to slap a hand on the roof.

“No, sorry, you can carry on.”

Jyn was honestly on the verge of throwing up, but held it together as the cab driver drove off in irritation. “I’m sorry,” she said hastily. “I shouldn’t have said – I just needed to – look, I’m leaving tomorrow so you don’t have to worry, ok?” she smiled weakly. “I just had to say it at least once, but it’s fine I’m not going to – to chase you down or demand an answer back or–”

“How long?”

His voice cut in, brisk and to the point. Her chest hurt.

“Don’t ask me that,” she said, softly.

“ _How long?_ ”

She sighed. “Around four years.”

“Jesus, Jyn.”

“I know.”

He rubbed his eyes and she resisted checking her phone, talking to the nearest bystander, running away, literally doing anything that might take her out of the conversation that she’d rather stab herself than continue being a part of. She knew it sounded ridiculous, sounded insane. Cassian Andor apparently did that to her.

“And you–” Cassian struggled for words. “Jyn, you – you’ve never said  _anything_  until now?”

“Look, this is quite possibly the most uncomfortable conversation of my life, can we please just drop it now?” she asked, desperately.

Cassian just laughed, a disbelieving chuckle directed at the sky and she blinked back tears that she would rather die than let fall. He wasn’t going to see how much this hurt. God, he had to hate her now! So much for not wanting to end up like Bevin, her relationship with Cassian was going to die anyway and all because she had decided to get all bloody  _emotional_  . This was certainly the last time she ever told anyone how she felt. She’d done enough, she’d gotten it off her chest, now she could go to D.C. with a clear conscience and without the life-long worry about what could have been. She knew now that it never would have been, no matter how much she may have secretly wished it to be, and it was better that she knew, it was,  _it was_  –

He was walking towards her. Why was he walking towards her?

She had roughly two seconds to prepare before he was taking her face in his hands and crushing his lips to hers. She held still, hardly believing this was where she had ended up.  _Fuck, fuck, fuck,_ what was going on? Eventually, he seemed to realise that she had been struck dead and he pulled back slightly so that he could see her face.

That was when she noticed the tears staining his cheeks.

“We are both complete idiots,” he said. “I love you, too.”

Well, shit.

She laughed wetly, Cassian joining her as he let one hand go to gently pull back some stray hairs around her face. “You’re kidding,” she said.

“I swear to you, I’m not.”

“Well, good,” She grabbed his jacket collar, pulling him in. He responded immediately, wrapping his arms tightly around her waist and she whimpered in satisfaction. This wasn’t a time for sweet. She poured every helpless hospital stay, every tension-filled night shift, every bullet taken into the kiss. She raked her nails through his hair, like she’d always imagined doing on long nights working impossible cases. Her body shivered when he made a noise of impatience and pleasure mixed together. God, she wanted to hear that again. Again and again, she wanted everything, all of him, anything that he would give her.

His arms loosened from around her, but only so his hands could run over her back. From her shoulder blades, they curved down her spine, over her hips. She felt him smile against her as the kiss slowed, became worshipful, reverent. She laughed a little. She wanted to keep it there, wanted to finally explore this thing between them, but didn’t exactly count on the hunger. It slowly grew more heated again, open-mouthed and feeling like she might implode. She could kick herself for it taking this long. They’d been through four years of pure professionalism, interjected occasionally by shooting murderers for each other or reassurances that they wouldn’t rather any other partner. They’d been through four years of proving that they would always do this thing together, but never exactly  _this_ thing until now. A part of her was ashamed that it took leaving to make her do anything about it, but perhaps a part of her had also taken that job on purpose: to subconsciously give herself the motivation ( _it had certainly worked, after all_ ). He bit her lip, beard rubbing against her chin and she figured though that she didn’t care what had gotten her here. She was just thankful it had.

“Do you think they realise that they’re still just making out in the middle of the street?”

Kay’s voice snapped them back. Whirling around, they realised that their friends had ended up gathering not-so-subtly at the entrance to the bar, quite obviously goggling at their antics. Bodhi was giggling as he held up his phone at them, Baze was shaking his head while Chirrut just applauded.

“Bravo!” he called out.

“You don’t even know what’s happening,” Kay pointed out.

“Trust me, I can imagine,” Chirrut threw back, happily.

“Bodhi, that better not be Facebook live–” Jyn managed several angry steps in his direction before Cassian held her back.

“Would it make you feel better if I said it was Snapchat?”

“You have the entire fucking precinct on Snapchat!” Jyn groaned. “My life is over.”

“Just throwing this question out here,” Baze rumbled then. “but does this mean you’re still leaving tomorrow?”

Jyn glanced over at Cassian. The answer was fairly easy.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

But Cassian was shaking his head. “Jyn, I can’t let you–” he began. “D.C. is an amazing opportunity, you’ve always wanted–”

“Maybe one day,” she insisted. “but not without you. I took that job so that I could run away. I don’t want to run.”

The look he gave her made her smile weakly. “No regrets.”

She reached out and took his hand, lacing their fingers together.

“No. None.”

**Author's Note:**

> So this isn't the crazy insane Fic that i've mentioned that I've been working on recently, rather something i did while blocked on the aforementioned fic while going an entire weekend without internet. I've always wanted to do a cop au and i was like 'yeah i'll just write a tiny oneshot while i try and figure out where the hell i'm going with this other fic' and like........7 thousand words later, i realised my mistake LOL 
> 
> EITHER WAY, i hope yall liked it, please tell me what you think!!!!  
> xoxo


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